7 Dumb Myths About Employee Engagement

There’s certainly a lot written about employee engagement these days. But not everything you read is true. These are the seven common myths floating around the Internet realm, and we're here to debunk them.

1. Employee engagement is nice, but it’s not that important

Employee engagement is more than nice — both from a worker’s and an organization’s perspective. Engaged employees are more productive than their disengaged peers. How much more productive, you ask? 12% more than their miserable peers, according to the University of Warwick. And beyond that, they’re less likely to look for work elsewhere.

For these reasons — and many more — engagement should be a top priority for all companies.

2. Employee performance should be assessed once a year

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Many organizations seem to think they should only check in with their employees every 12 months. But because they only provide a snapshot for one specific moment in time, annual performance reviews aren’t really useful. And because of that, 51% of employees see their reviews as inaccurate, as Globoforce found in their survey.

Instead of reviewing employees annually, organizations should make use of new technologies that make it easier than ever to check in with your staff on a weekly basis. In doing so, they’re able to nip any problems in the bud right away instead of uncovering them after they’ve been growing for a while.

3. There is only so much you can do to improve engagement

Ask many managers, and they’ll tell you the same thing: if you want to improve engagement, you need to give your employees more money or more perks. Those tactics might work. But they’re not the only ones you can employ to boost engagement.

Just ask Tariq Farid, the founder of Edible Arrangements. Farid often looks for ways to better engage his employees, and he’s had success finding new ones. An example? A boring meeting can become fun by introducing karaoke. Who knew?

4. Improving culture starts from the top

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It’s true those at the top of the totem pole carry authority. And managers don’t get to where they are by chance — they often have great ideas. But that doesn’t mean employees in the lower ranks aren’t capable of coming up with great ideas of their own.

Encourage your workers to offer their ideas about improving engagement, and put the best ones into practice.

5. Managers aren’t really affected by employee engagement

Engagement isn’t just nice to have for your employees. It also works wonders for managers. A more engaged workforce works harder and produces more. In other words, the more engaged employees are, the easier the manager’s job is.

6. Workers should only be rewarded for huge projects

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Who doesn’t like being positively recognized for their efforts at work? From management’s perspective, recognizing your employees is an easy way to keep them engaged. Some companies seem to think that employees should only be rewarded for their work on major projects. But most of our jobs consist of a lot of little tasks that add up to something bigger.

According to our Employee Engagement Report, less than one out of three employees feels valued at work. To boost the statistics of your own team, start recognizing workers for some of the smaller things, too.

7: There’s a one-size-fits-all solution to engagement

No two organizations are the same. What works to increase engagement at one company might fall on deaf ears at another. If you want to be sure that your efforts to increase engagement will succeed, directly solicit ideas from your employees — the more frequently, the better.

Because the working world has now become a candidate's market, employers must think of new, innovative ways to keep their employees engaged. If you don't, then you're basically nudging them out the door and into your competitors' laps.